ANGELS AND DEMONS
by Daughter of Kyne
Summary: Joshua Kiryuu had fallen long before Shibuya even existed — hiding in a world that would always fear him. Yet he never expected to care for such an insignificant human such as her. All it took was realizing she was the only one who would look at him like he was human. This is their story — a story of a brother fighting for a sister he never asked for, but needed. [Drabble.]


_A/N: "The World Ends with You" and characters belong to Square Enix. This is my take on the character Yoshiya "Joshua" Kiryuu and my OC. Please review and let me know your thoughts.  
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 _ **ANGELS AND DEMONS**_

It should not have ever been like this.

Yet, life was cruel and a battlefield. It had always been that way. In a way, everyone was cursed.

It started when they were children — siblings who could only turn to each other for protection, trying desperately to hide from the world's malevolent eyes. They only found solace within each other's embrace; only found a way to fight back through encouragement through each other. At the end of all things, they only relied upon each other — even with the terrible secrets he would hide.

Like the fact he wasn't the brother she had played with as a child — now only wearing the flesh of him.

They had been born in Japan, born as Arisa and Yoshiya Kiryuu. It was when she turned eight and he turned three were they taken overseas — given new individualities and personas to hide with, to escape the judgment and fear of others. They were given Christian names, looked after by an estranged relative during their childhood and early teens.

They were forced to learn control over the instability of their minds — their bodies hardly able to contain the grace of him, and the power of her. Still, they pushed for control — for it was the only way to gain the love of their parents once again. It was the only way to suppress who they truly were.

Years later, they returned to their homeland, now void of the light that once filled their identical eyes, swirling like amethysts in shade — a trait passed down through the Kiryuu line that marked them as what they were.

The correct term was psychics. The term they came to know was gifted.

It was a lie for him — a perfect cover-up, while it was a cruel reality she had to bear.

She had just turned eighteen when the accident claimed the lives of the familiar strangers who brought them — her as a whole and him as a vessel — into the world. None of their relatives stepped up to claim them. No one wanted the burden or horror that came with them. They feared the Kiryuu siblings.

They feared _him_.

He took on his Christian name, as a way to separate himself from his past self — as a way to feel a bit closer to home. She took on her given name, as a way to reform the individuality she had lost.

Joshua was fifteen when it all started. His mind was maturing, along with his powers — his body had to adapt to the growing power inside of him. He could see the souls of the Underground. The forbidden fruit he had known — the sole reason he had been damned to begin with — once again called his name. He knew the game that life and death played — falling hand-in-hand, twisted and corrupt in its own way.

Though, through the eyes of a misguided child, it was vibrant and bright.

The only color he found in this black and grey world.

Arisa would come home to an empty apartment, struggling to make ends meet and to provide for the only family she had left. Long days of labor, working until her fingers would bleed — dealing with the discrimination and the attacks of society for being strange, being indifferent. Every word spoken to her was a snide remark.

The same went for her precious baby brother — her sole reason for existence.

He would come home, hiding behind arrogance and smirks — his silver tongue his best weapon. But as the sunlight drifted as another day would pass, the mask would slip — showing the vulnerable child underneath who sought a loving embrace. His time in the world had changed him.

He actually started to believe himself to be as human as the flesh he wore.

Violet eyes would look at him with understanding, her arms being held open for him as his footsteps would cross their small apartment, before he would lower himself onto the worn mattress and rest his head on her small shoulder. She would run her fingers through his ashe blond locks, falling in unkempt waves and hiding the misted eyes.

His hands would clutch at the back of her shirt, fingers entangling in ashe brown waves that tumbled down her back and framed her face — the only kind face he knew in this world. Her whispered words of love were the only piece of reality he held on to.

If Arisa vanished, his world would crumble.

He would be alone, lost in a desolate void that would leave him broken.

Tragedy struck — and the humane fear that had buzzed in the back of his skull became his cruel reality. Salvation slipped through their fingers that fateful day — a week before the final game would be played in the battleground that was known as Shibuya. Regret pulsated through the young Composer those three weeks, fighting to keep himself from breaking all the rules.

Life and death fell hand-in-hand, with the threads of the tapestry of Fate thin and about to snap. What other choice did he have but to entwine his beloved sister's thread the life of another's? His chosen Player.

She died because of him, trying to save him from being eliminated in the dangerous Game he had created. Her entry fee was her memories, the love for her brother — the very foundation of who she was. Her partner was strong — he would at least give the silent and foreboding woman _that much_ — but that was all he would give her. She would have to do — even though she was not the one he prefered.

She was not Neku.

Joshua watched as his dearly beloved sibling fought and laughed, content in her oblivion. He watched every painful second tick as she fought in a game without a reason to live — yet her strength, her light, pushed her forward.

In the end, not even the Composer could pull a fast one over Death's eyes, and not even the Composer's sister could escape His clutches so easily.

Arisa was put to a trial. Only one could go free, and with the life of her partner's lover hanging in the balance, Arisa had forced her partner to return to the Realground and leave the Underground. Then, she was entered in the Game again.

Sadly, another's entry fee took away her chance of survival — the very boy whose life had twisted with hers, entangled red threads on the skein of Fate. They would never know each other in _that_ time, _that_ place — yet Fate would intend for them to encounter under very different circumstances.

Fate liked to twist everything, and in the end it all came to down to Neku Sakuraba.

He owed more to Neku than he would ever truly let on. So with solemn eyes filled with gratitude and regret — three weeks later — while perched high on the eighteenth story and looking over the battleground that had given him life through death, Joshua watched as the first friends in his life met up for the first time. They would never know he was there, watching over them as the fallen angel he had came to be.

Arisa won her second chance.

It had been seven years since that day when the Game became an Endgame. He moved through the bustling town, crowded in streets, with eyes taking in the world and seeing those struggling with death. He had learned his lesson and locked away his gift. He now had something to live for.

He had _her_ to live for — the last traces of grace burning within him becoming scattered ashes of a past better left hidden in the shadows, where he thrived and protected those he called "friend" and guarded the city he came to love.

Joshua would come home to a quaint house with a swing in the yard, hearing the laughter of his niece and nephew as they rushed into his arms, gazing up and at the beautiful face of the only person who had ever loved him, standing beside her husband's side and smiling. He would ruffle the vibrant orange tresses of his niece, trying to do the same to her brother as he would quickly run away from the affections — headphones blocking out the noise of the world around him, just like his father before him. He would look toward the ones he knew he would give the last of Heaven for — for the closest to Heaven he would ever be would always be Arisa's smile.

He had once been a wretch, struggling to breathe and keep himself sane — playing with mankind as if they were toys.

He had once been a Composer, ruling over the battleground where he had eventually found himself — his humanity.

Now, he was simply a young man, trying to accept and love the cold world that he wanted to burn.

Temptation be damned, Joshua's heart would never allow him to do that — not if it meant bringing tears to her eyes.

After all, she was just as twisted as him — an angel living in darkness.

As he was a demon living in light.


End file.
